This Week in the Ancient Near East

A Note to Our Listener

This Week in the Ancient Near East is taking a short break while one member of our plucky band recovers from a nasty illness. We’ll be back soon with all new episodes and the same old schtick!

The Prehistoric Spanish Cave of Drugs, Death and Fun! Or, the Clan of the Cave Hair?

A burial cave on the Western Mediterranean island of Minorca dating to 1000 BCE contained 200 individuals and wooden boxes of dyed human hairs. The hairs were full of drugs, which leads our contestants to ask just what kind of parties were going on down there and why we weren’t invited. A few flashbacks to the 1970s result.

The Toilets of Iron Age Jerusalem, A View from Below, or, Dysentery and the Bible?

Excavation of Iron Age cesspits in Jerusalem has us thinking many things. These include 1) wow, they actually recovered protozoa that caused dysentery, how’d they do that, and, 2) umm, Jerusalem elites were really unhealthy. Our contestants try to keep the juvenile humor to a minimum.

The Copper Age Princess of Iberia? Or, I Want to Live With A Cinnabar Girl

A new article suggests that an elite Copper Age burial in southern Spain belonged to a young woman, not a man, and that society was a matriarchy. Our contestants are a little conflicted about reconstructing society starting with a single tooth, but it sounds a bit like Barbie Land, which is cool with us.

A Late Roman Cave of Necromancy and Intrigue, or, A Backdoor to the Underworld in Beth Shemesh?

A cave near Beth Shemesh in Israel seems to have been a Late Roman portal to the underworld. How do we know? Did the detached skulls tell us? Our contestants take pro and anti-necromancy stances, but in a good way.

The Bird Calls of Prehistory, or the Squeaky Flutes of the Natufian

A new report on Natufian aerophones from Eynan-Mallaha has us wondering, what’s an aerophone? It’s a bone with holes, sort of like a flute or a bird call. So are humans replicating bird sounds to catch birds or to make music? Is all this ritual or is it just hunting? All the same, really, isn't it? 

The Stone Receipts of Early Roman Jerusalem, or, Economic History on the Rocks

A new inscription from Jerusalem’s Pilgrim’s Road looks like a receipt from the Early Roman period. It’s also on a piece of stone, which seems difficult to file. We’ve got Emily Dickinson and emojis, religious observance, and the suspicious relationship between writing and literacy. With a special shoutout to Major Deegan and his expressway!

The Dismembered Hands of Avaris, or How Do You Say “The Sound of One Hand Clapping” in Egyptian?

Pits with dismembered hands at the Hyksos site of Tell el Dab’a/Avaris have us asking, what is it with ancient Egypt and dismemberment? Sure the king wants to permanently defeat his enemies – really, who doesn’t want that - but isn’t all this hand chopping business just, well, performance art? It’s our most hands on episode yet!